The Importance of Hearth-Keeping

Cleaning is not made for those of us who were built for grand gestures. It is a war of attrition against the dust; little things over and over and over again, never ending. A lesson in entropy. When you live for the flash, for the romance of it all, it’s hard to find that in …

Practice Makes Progress: April 1st to 15th

It’s been a while since my last post, and even longer since my last Practice Makes Progress post, which I’d hoped to make a regular feature. Mea culpa. Life’s been weird. I’m sure it has been for you too. In my last post I mentioned moving up to Powell River to help take care of …

My Polytheism

I am sort of fried today. Didn’t sleep well, despite the CPAP; think I’ll have to lay off the coffee so late at night. I thought music would help me write but it just distracted me, and I’m sitting here trying to get my thoughts on the page and making typos every other word and …

30 Days of Paganism: Pantheon — Hellenic Gods

I don’t honor all the gods of the Hellenic pantheon. There’s some evidence that They prefer you take the pantheon as a whole, but I have a geas on me from my Father that I shall have no interaction with Poseidon, unless I am absolutely forced into a situation where it is unavoidable — at …

Motivation (or, How I Need to Trick Myself to Get Shit Done)

I’m trying to find ways to motivate myself right now. It’s not easy. I’ve been stuck in a depressive funk for a while and I’m not sure why. Even on days when my mood is stable/okay, I’m still unmotivated to do anything. I keep thinking I should really reorganize and clean the pantry, I should …

Putting the ‘mundane’ back in ‘mystic’

I’ve been thinking for a little bit about something said elseweb, about how we get this idea that religion has to be big and lifechanging and amazing all the time and that we need to have patron gods and Very Close Relationships with Them in order to be Proper Pagans because…well, that’s what gets talked …

Embodiment while broken

I never really noticed how much of my religion is physical until I couldn’t do it anymore. I broke my leg and possibly did some tendon/ligament damage in the knee — unknown at this point — over a week ago. On July 4th, ironically — there is no freedom in this situation. There’s a whole …

Shrine to Hestia, March 17th

I’ve started an actual daily practice: lighting candles and giving coffee or tea (whatever my morning beverage is) to Hestia (who receives the first offering every day, traditionally, and the last offering every evening — I haven’t done that, not sure if I will; spoons, etc). I don’t say anything. It’s a silent ritual. That …

Honoring Hestia

I want to honor Hestia. The best ways to do this, She told me, were to keep my house clean and tidy, and to be hospitible to guests. Cleanliness and hospitality. She doesn’t ask for perfection; She doesn’t expect it from mortals. But She does ask for an honest, consistent, effort. Keeping the house clean …

The Key

I wear a key around my neck. It rests on a chain next to a silver and gold (or gold and white gold; can’t tell) snake pendant and a gold ring with a small sapphire in it (that has never fit me, so on my necklace it stays). The key itself is silver colored, and …